 Ik heb op de Intel NUK gezien als een muzieksserver, dat was afvorderbaar, werkt fijn, maar een beetje fiddelig om te zetten, zoals ik in mijn 3-part video showed. Ik heb de Rune Nucleus Plus server gereverd dat alleen een drijf voel van muziek nodig was om te spelen, maar dat kwam bij de premium. Dit keer een muzieksserver dat is makkelijk om te zetten, onderzoek op welke protocol gebruik voor audio-servers en dat kost niet een arm en een leg. Er is dit ding in het audioworld en misschien beyond dat, waar er een heel low appreciation is voor goede software, alstubel in het monitair sens. Dit is zo ongelooflijk, omdat je onmogelijk is dat je alle kleine problemen in de muzieksserver kunt ontdekken als ik de vragen van me vragen zie. En ik kan echt niet helpen in die individuele cases. Ik ben niet clairvoyend en remote toevallig te zetten betekent meer tijd dan ik kan uitvoeren. Dat is waarom ik de muzieksserver die ik hier discussieerde kwam. Alleen heel basic computer schilders zijn nodig om het op te zetten en het komt met een lifetijdsupport. De Sonic Transporter i5 heeft een zwarte aluminium houding en is ongeveer de zes van een Mac Mini, 58 x 134 x 172 mm. De vondt houdt alleen de powerbutton. Short presses switchen de computer erop, waardoor een long press voortst het om het op te switchen zonder de software te voortstellen, zoals ook andere normale computer. En in feite is het een normale, funless computer gemaakt door Polywell dat een Intel Core i5 5257U at 2.7 GHz en heeft 8 gigabytes of RAM en een 64 gigabyte SSD binnenkant voor de server database. De rear zorgt voor twee USB3 portten, een HDMI en VGA portten, voor servicepurpose alleen, dus er is geen audio over HDMI, twee USB2 portten, een gigabyte ethernet port en de 12 volt DC power input. Waardoor er vier USB portten zijn, alleen één USB drive kan op een keer behoorlijk zijn. Nee, ik ga de computer niet openen, omdat er niet veel is om audiowise te leren. Wat is interessant audiowise is de server versie van de Sonic Allbitter OS dat je kunt zien als een Linux-base frontend van waar je de server software wilt gebruiken. Just open an internet browser on another computer, tablet of smartphone and type sonictransport.local in the address field. The HTML interface includes a mobile version so even on a smartphone maintenance is done with ease. The apps menu lets you check if there is an update for the Sonic Transporter OS. Check on the installed software and lets you install other software. Since the software version was up to date, lets go to the installed apps. Currently DriveMounter and Roon Server are installed, but installing another type of server like HQ Player Server, Minim Server, Plex Media Server, Bubble UPNP Server, Subsonic Media Streamer or Squeezewalk Server is a matter of a few clicks to stop or uninstall Roon Server and installing the alternative. I ran also Roon Server and Squeezewalk Server simultaneously, although this is foolish of course, since Roon is capable of driving Squeezeboxes as well. For paid software like HQ Player and Roon, you do need to buy the license separately. Also keep in mind that erasing a server software will also erase the library data. Instructions on how to save and backup this data can be found in the forum. Next to the server programs, there are also some nice tools like the Sonora UPNP bridge that lets you use selected DLNA renderers as endpoint for Roon or Squeezebox. I didn't try this since I didn't have an appropriate DLNA renderer available during the testing. Judging by the forum information, this is really something for the enthusiast. When you open the settings for Roon Server, there will be options dat de Roon Rock Server doesn't offer. You can have the server access the drive containing your music in read-only mode, so protecting your music collection. This also means that you can't connect to the drives on the sonic transporter using a filefinder and thus need to connect to drive to another computer to add music or change the settings temporarily of course. A second option lets you switch on of off local playback in the Roon Server. I presume it saves resources when local playback is not used. Remarkable is that you have to mount a USB drive manually using the external drive mounter while Roon Rock offers auto mounting. But it needs to be done only once, so it's not really a problem. For the rest you use the Roon interface for all settings in Roon. The same goes for the other programs. The Squeezebox server looked functionally identical to the regular version and I presume the same goes for the other server programs. A feature I really like is the system status that shows the CPU load. It takes away uncertainty if there is something wrong in your system. According to Small Green Computer, the sonic transporter i5 is suited for music libraries up to 450.000 tracks. I can't imagine there are many people that have that amount of tracks. To show you how powerful the sonic transporter i5 is, I started playback of 8 streams while still importing music. On the right, the CPU load as indicated by the system status. The top graph shows the cumulative load, ignore de lower grounds and certainly don't think there are 4 cores. The Intel Hyperthreading technology simulates 4 cores as where there are just two. As you can see, that's probably all you need and it results in a 9 watts specified power consumption. Another thing on this test, most streams also needed DSP work since they were chosen for that. Look at the zones panel. The top Apple TV played DSD and thus needed to be downsampled to 44.1 kHz. The second Apple TV was playing downsampled music from 24192, as was the Jabra Bluetooth headset connected to my iMac 5K and the Sonos. The other endpoints could handle the higher sampling rates. Please realize that these are 8 separate signals and not one track sent to all endpoints. In de background, er were also other DSP functions active. Headroom management minus 3db and 3 band stop filters at 32, 64 en 128 Hz, with a Q of 15. At no single moment did the CPU load exceed 85%. Where the sound is concerned, the following. If you use the sonic transporter as intended, using a network audio interface like the Sonori or SOtM models or other endpoints connected over the network, the sonic transporter doesn't sound. Meaning that there is no sound quality difference with other well built audio servers in the same situation. Only when you connect the DAC directly to it, the sound quality will be influenced. Don't forget that the hardware is just a good vanilla computer. It's not better or worse than an Intel NUC running Rune Rock or Rune Nuculus Plus. Only if you use a computer that is specially tweaked for audio or a streamer built to do the server part as well, you might get results equal to using a networked audio interface. A rather expensive way to go. I receive many questions on this topic and will dive deeper into this next month. The US price is 795 dollars. European viewers keep in mind that prices in the States are always excluding sales tax, as where in Europe vendors are obliged to publish prices including sales tax called VAT. Also realize that the sonic transporter i5 comes with an operating system. I know, if you're computer savvy, you could use Rune Rock or Linux and that's free. But for those that are not, be aware that even mounting a drive in Linux system can take you an hour or more if you don't know anything about Linux. Been there, done it. I've been looking around and found a silent NUC and when configured identically it costed 1000 euros. If you want to save money, go for a NUC with a forced cooling and step back to an Intel Core i3 processor if your music library isn't big and you don't want to do DSP functions. What you can't buy separately is a sonic orbiter server version. And although I have installed Rune Rock many times for my testing and for people in the trade that rather have me do it, I enjoy the almost plug and play approach small green computers have. For reference I will place links to the other reviews of servers en keep a keen eye for other interesting servers. So if you're interested in more of these, subscribe to this channel or follow me on twitter, facebook of google plus. If you like this video, please consider supporting the channel through Patreon or Paypal. Any financial support is much appreciated. The links are in the comments. Help you to help even more people enjoy music at home by telling your friends on the web about this channel. I'm Hans Beekhuyzen, thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com. And whatever you do, enjoy the music.